Michael Stackpole - Of Limited Loyalty

Owen shivered, then glanced at Hodge. “Does Miss Felicity know you are intending to ask her to marry?”

Hodge stirred a pot in which he was melting snow. “Well, sir, I’m not sure that she does. Being the winter and all, and half of that spent in Plentiful helping them rebuild, I didn’t get to see her much. But Mr. Caleb tells me that, according to his sister, Felicity’s not being courted at the moment. I might imagine one of the Fifth might take a shine to her, so I will not lament our returning direct to Temperance. I was hoping, in fact, we might run across a deer or tanner or something I could shoot and bring her a bit of, you know, to show I can be a provider. Do you think that plan will work?”

“It has things to recommend it.” Owen stopped himself from chuckling. “Of course, you might ask Caleb to ask his sister what Miss Felicity likes, and you could obtain a sample thereof to catch her eye.”

Hodge took the pot off the fire and stirred in some tea leaves. “Now there I was knowing you would know what to do. Was that how you won your Catherine’s heart?”

Owen hesitated. At one time he would have answered in the affirmative, but from time to time he’d been given to ask himself why she had married him. That caused him to recall, with a certain amount of embarrassment, that she had actually come after him. It wasn’t a question of his winning her heart, but that she let him believe he had won it.

“Different circumstances, I think, Hodge, but you can’t go wrong there. Women like a provider, but they also like to know a man is thinking of them even when they aren’t there.”

The smaller man nodded. “Wish I hadn’t gone back so soon from the ruin. Ever since the Gazette printed that story about the dire wolves, and General Rathfield decided to make his wolfskin into a pelisse, well, they’ve been all the rage. If I had a skin or two, no question she’d be mine.”

“You’re welcome to the ones I have in the attic.” Owen smiled easily. The Shedashee had cleaned and preserved the wolfskins and had sent them east. Owen had stored them in the attic, figuring to sell them in the spring. “I have five of them, and no real use for them.”

“No, sir, I didn’t shoot it, I don’t want it. Not that I don’t mind the offer.” Hodge strained tea from the pot into two battered tin mugs, then handed one to Owen. “And I’d not be liking to see any of them wolves on our trip back. If it were to happen, though…”

“I’ll give you first shot.”

“Obliged, sir.” Hodge raised his cup in a salute. “It does surprise me though that your wife hasn’t had them skins made into a coat. It would make her the belle of society in Temperance.”

“That’s why she doesn’t do it, Hodge.” Owen blew on his tea. “She won’t ever let herself show up the Princess. Since the Prince has not made his wife a coat of wolf-pelts, Catherine won’t ask me to make her one.”

“That the same reason she hasn’t told you to make a pelisse like General Rathfield?”

“That sort of short cloak looks good with a uniform, Hodge, not over Church clothes.” Owen sipped tea, then sighed. “The General does cut a dashing figure, doesn’t he?”

“I think, sir, some will say that, but few will have been at Anvil Lake.”

Owen laughed.

“What, sir?”

“Hodge, at Anvil Lake, you were serving Her Majesty.”

“As were you, sir.”

“And that’s why I laugh.” Owen opened his arms. “Look at us. It’s been four years. We’re wearing homespun and skins. We’re both counting ourselves as Mystrians, and judging men from Norisle by the same standards Mystrians would.”

Hodge smiled. “I’m thinking of marrying a nice Mystrian girl.”

“Right. What happened to us, Hodge?”

The smaller’s face scrunched up a bit, then he nodded once, curtly. “I think, sir, that when we were from Norisle, we spent a lot of time being told what to do by men who thought they knew best what that was. Out here, we’re asked to do the best we can, doing the things that are best for Mystria. That kind of freedom, sir, is something one can come to enjoy. And I don’t see any reason here and now or hereafter, to be going back to the other way of life.”

5 April 1768 Temperance Temperance Bay, Mystria

Prince Vlad leaned forward over the map table in his laboratory, supporting himself on his arms. A million things banged around in his head. He should have been rejoicing. He had a second wooly rhinoceros in his pen, a totally new species of creature scattered over a long table, numerous jars, and a drying rack, and his surveying efforts were proving wildly successful.

The problem is that all of those things point to our being on the brink of a devastating war.

Count von Metternin and Gisella stood on either side of the table. A map of the northeastern region of Mystria covered the table. Plentiful appeared a third of the way in from Temperance, and Happy Valley a third further west-southwest. Rivers and lakes had been drawn in blue ink, and ghost rivers in green. The surveys covering them had been by no means comprehensive, so some appeared as shattered wheels with no rim and broken spokes radiating out for short distances.

Vlad straightened up, rubbing a hand over his jaw, clutching his other arm to his chest. “I’m certain Piety was built on a nexus. I’m certain a survey team would find a line between it and the ruins. You’ve also noted that both the summer and winter locations for Saint Luke appear to share ghost river lines. Even the preliminary information from Owen suggests lines which would connect known Shedashee settlements and sacred sites.”

The Count nodded. “You would suggest, then, that Piety was destroyed because it occupied a nexus point?”

“That, or its location on a nexus point made it easier to destroy.” Vlad frowned. “Until Gisella and I discovered that another medium can be used to make magick work, we believed that it worked at touch only. That was one of two constants to magick. The second was that to use magick was to tire and damage the person using it. Experiments suggest that there are magickal currents, energy currents, in the world. They provide a substrate through which magick can move. It is not unreasonable to suggest that if a sorcerer can manipulate those currents, he could produce a bigger effect with less expense to himself.”

Gisella nodded. “So that having Piety on a nexus would have supplemented a Norghaest’s power.”

“Yes.” Vlad squeezed his eyes shut, then shook his head. “So many theories, and so much information to sort out.”

Gisella moved to his side, stroking his right shoulder. “Beloved, you can only work with the things you know.”

“Yes, darling, but there is so much I need to know.” Vlad gave her a smile, then pointed toward the wurmrest. “We have determined that a thaumagraph can send a message between units at a speed of roughly fifty miles a day. I have been thinking that this is the rough speed of magick. In a tactical situation that’s a yard per second. Much slower than a musket ball, but potentially more damaging than a cannon ball. The problem is, of course, that Mugwump flew to Happy Valley, I shall assume, because the use of Norghaest magick attracted him. At the normal speed of magick, it would have taken four days for the magick to reach him, but the only manifestations I can verify happened just hours before we headed off. Have I the wrong speed? I don’t…”

Von Metternin shook his head. “That is not something you will know, not immediately, Highness. Perhaps not ever. What you do know is the speed at which the thaumagraph can function. At fifty miles a day, it is much faster than a man on foot or horseback, and ghost rivers can increase that speed. This is why you have been able to issue summonses to the Rangers, to bring them together so quickly. That is what is important.”